Review: 2001: A Space Odyssey

5/4

This won't quite be a review. I have seen this film I estimate eight times, so all impressions are gone and all I can do now is soak into its murky depths. It is easiest to tell the quality of a movie probably after the second viewing in a year's time. After a few viewings, you concern yourself more with the world of the movie than with the movie as a movie. This is absolutely the case with 2001. I can't say how great it is... All I can attest to is its originality--it does things that no other pieces of cinema have even dreamed of--and its finesse--there are techniques used here that are the pinnacle of fine direction--and its effect--no other film in my eyes can equal the feelings of disturbance and hypnosis.
I was asked why I got into this movie after the first time--why this is among my couple favorite movies. I thought back to those first couple viewings...probably 4 years ago, age 15. I called it genius immediately, if only for its imagination. Is it genius simply to be able to think outside convention?
I also marveled at the feelings it invoked in me. Never was I bored in this film, not for a second: I was so invested and engaged in this world that I felt every second of this long and slow-paced film. I take pride in how I was able to handle this film, especially at first. I have never demonstrated greater patience or appreciation in my life, I don't think.
The feelings I experienced were transcendental. They rose above life and pushed me into the abnormal. I felt wonderful there. It felt like drugs to me, every time. But it wasn't the physical feeling, it was believing finally that there was more to life. That's what was addicting: believing that there was another level to the world and I could see into it.
I don't have a clear-cut interpretation of this film. Even this time I was thinking things I had never thought before. I'm not sure whether Kubrick knew what truly happened or not. I certainly don't, and don't think I ever will, but I'm excited about the idea of eventually finding my own 2001: a plot that nobody sees but nobody can dispute.
This was my first viewing of it in my current filmgoing era (beginning around the entrance of summer '14, a few months ago). I consider it to be sci-fi-horror. It certainly feels like a horror movie to me. The only reason one wouldn't call it that is because of its unconventional restrain. But don't all the greatest movies have that? The horror in 2001 comes from a close-up of HAL's little red bulb, or from the wailing on the black screen, or from an astronaut's terrifying face frozen in time: we don't see the evil, but by what we're shown we know it's there. That's Kubrick's brilliance. He shows us the surface and we're terrified by what's underneath.